Thursday, August 28, 2014

I used to attempt, in vain, to influence Elijah and Luca’s
musical taste.I thought it was my duty
to expose them to the right music, so they’d be able to site me as an influence
when being interviewed by rock and roll magazines in the future.I’m assuming it will be “Space Rolling
Stone.”

But I stopped.Partly
because it’s kind of jerk-ish and selfish to force you kids to listen to your
favorite music (forcing them to watch “The Simpsons” is another matter
entirely).But mostly because my taste
in music isn’t that great.

Unfortunately, their anime obsessed nanny had taken over the
mantle of music influence and has introduced them to the worst thing in the
world: Korean boy bands.Or band.I think it’s one band.I don’t actually know the name.I think it’s Pax or Xap or something like
that.

Elijah and Luca watch their videos on Youtube
constantly.And from what I can gather
in the two second I watch them before barfing, every single song goes like
this:

1.Boyish Asian girl walks down rainy street.

2.Guy with Mo haircut sings.

3.Guy with bleached hair sings.

4.All sing.

5.Bad boy with dyed red hair does a rap.

6.All sing.

7.Boyish Asian girl throws herself off a cliff.

I try so hard not to complain because it’s there thing and
they should have things that don’t involve “The Simpsons.”And when Elijah imitates the dancing it’s the
greatest thing in the world.But
occasionally I’ll shout, “This is garbage!You should be listening to Led Zepplin man!”

Which I know makes me so unbelievably uncool in their
eyes.Old man yells at kids to listen to
old man music.Their eyes almost pop out
of their heads from rolling.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to listen to some old
timey Beatles.

Friday, August 22, 2014

Last weekend I took the boys to Diana’s sister’s place in
Dixon Illinois for a BBQ.We had a great
time but had to leave far to early to make the 3+ hour drive home in time for
the boys to refuse to go to bed.

As we passed through Dixon, we spotted a fighter jet at the
side of the road.The boys shouted their
approval at the military might.The jet
looked in nice condition and not part of some junk dealer/meth dealer’s
collection, so I swung the car over to let Elijah and Luca get a closer look.

The Jet was joined by a pretty mean looking helicopter and
tank and a M*A*S*H style ambulance that seemed to be banished in the
corner.

The boys sprang from the car and ran full tilt towards the
weapons.Luca screamed death at the top
of his lungs.“Pew pew pew!Kapow!”

I walked under a small white arch and realized this was a
memorial to the fallen soldiers of Illinois, not a Michael Bay set.

“Dad. Dad.Did you
see the guns?The guns?Do you think that gun could kill us?Do you think that gun could blow up the car?”

I assumed a sober stance of Dad Who Ruins Everything.

“Guys.This is a
memorial.A memorial is a place that
honors dead people.These things are
here to honor people who died for America.They fought for…you know…freedom.”

I was determined not to let them dishonor the dead, but I
also didn’t want to get all liberal hippie dippie on them.

“Let’s go over and read this plaque,” said Dad Who Ruins
Everything.

Smartly, Luca ran away to peer into the helicopter
cockpit.Eli stood by me because I was
holding onto his t-shirt.

Eli wriggled away and stood underneath the jet.I walked over, slowly and churchy to show
them how to behave at a memorial.Luca
raced over, barely touching the ground and begged me for answers about the kind
of death this huge thing could deal.

I stood for a moment of silence and said, “It goes
WHOOOOOOSHHHHHH!BOOOM!PEW PEW PEW PEW!”

Friday, August 15, 2014

The other night, the boys were being unbelievably cute.They were all scrubbed and shiny from their
baths and had somehow picked out the more adorable PJs in the world.They were wrestling like puppies in a cute
and not screamy way.Even when they
acted like jerks it was in a Bugs Bunny “Ain’t I a stinker?” way.

I was exhausted from a bike ride, so I was hitting the sack
in the ungodly early hour Diana usually goes to bed.I heard Elijah and Luca squealing in their
room, still awake, so I made the announcement that we were all sleeping
together in mom and dad’s bed.I couldn’t
bear their cuteness being wasted on their fish.

I wrestled Luca to the bed and positioned him next to
me.Eli stood at the foot of the bed,
unsure.But then he decided he could do
more damage under the covers.

The boys started a wrestling match.

“No.No.No.Sleep. We’re being loving family
here.This is magical.Stop that.”

Elijah got bored and asked if he could please go back and
sleep in his own bed.I refused him.

Luca then decided it was more comfortable sleeping with his
feet on the pillows and his face down by Grover.Elijah decided to borrow down into the sheets
and attempt to dig under the dog.Grover, for all his semi hatred of my sons, moved not a muscle.He had established a beachhead and was not
moving.

Monday, August 11, 2014

Sometimes the antics are so hackneyed on HamannEggs that it
often feels like I’m stealing them from 1980’s sitcom plots.But almost everything that happens in this
blog is true.I just exaggerate my
failures for comedic effect.

So now I’d like to regale you with the uber hacky “Dad won’t
let sons play with toy he bought them” story.

It started off on the wrong foot.I bought the boys two toys I secretly
wanted.These big robots based on a
super violent video game I play nightly.The boys are vaguely aware of the game, mostly because I yell at them
not to watch me play it.“You’ll get
nightmares!” I’d shout as they try to get a peek at what makes their father
swear so much.

But the prospect of a toy, any toy, was enough to make them
behave like angels all week.When we
arrived at the toy store, the boys asked if they could possibly receive
something they actually wanted instead of the robots, but I shut that down
right quick.

When I shoved the boxes into their hands, I noticed in big
letters “Ages 8 and up.”But who really
pays attention to those safety things anyway.

I raced home to open up the toys and maybe, just maybe let
the boys play with them.We opened up
the boxes and an avalanche of teeny, tiny parts tumbled out.I suggested Elijah build one, as he was a
year away from being of the recommended age, and I build the other.

I didn’t hear him because I was too busy screaming, “I hate
this!It’s too hard to build!”

Hour one went by with no robot.Hour two came and went with no robot.I even called my brother and begged him to
come over and help me with the construction.By hour three, we had one robot built.

I proudly handed it to Luca and it fell apart into a
thousand tiny pieces.I banished the boys
from the dining room by declaring loudly, “This is a dada job.”Diana walked in at this moment and burst into
laughter.

Well after both boys had lost any and all interest in the
dumb robots, Steve and I had the little fragile bastards together.We gingerly placed the robots on Eli’s
bookshelf and informed everyone that these were toys for looking at and not playing
with.

Monday, August 4, 2014

I used to think I was good in a crisis.That if push came to shove I’d be able to
take charge, make great emergency decisions and save the day in a clear headed,
Captain America way.

Used to.

Yesterday, we visited Diana’s family out in the suburbs.It was a mini family reunion featuring a
dozen adults, gaggle of iPhone absorbed teens and four little people under the
age of 8.

At one point, the four little people were trying to track
and kill a fox on the premises.I
watched Diana’s little brother, who I will forever view as 26 years old, go out
to help them search.

A half hour later, Diana’s older sister announced that the
kids were missing.Were they in the TV
room?Nope.Were they in the backyard?Nope.Were they in the front yard or visible in the massive field across the
street?Nope.Uh oh.

This would have been a good time for my brain to remind me
and the rest of the family that the kids were with Diana’s brother and that
they were fine, off on an adventure.But
my brain was on vacation in this crisis.

The parental vibe got a little panicky and we spread out to
go yell at the missing kids.

As we yelled, a woman walked by and said, “Are you looking
for four little kids?”

Yes.Yes we were.

“Oh, they walked away with an older gentleman.He said he was going to show them some
spiders under the bridge.”

Instead of my brain speaking up and saying, “Oh yeah.That older gentlemen was Mike.Who you just saw playing with the kids,
dummy,” it completely shut down and went into screaming panic mode.

Older gentleman?Bridge?Spiders?My mind became occupied with the end of my
life as I knew it.Of hastily made
posters and pleading on local news and the eventual made for TV movie and me
basically becoming the new host of “America’s Most Wanted.”My brain simply stopped working rationally
and every instinct I had was to curl up into a ball and wait for the sweet
release of death.

Diana and my brother in law Jamie went into destroy
mode.They began running towards the
bridge with the expressed purpose of murdering this spidery older gentleman.

Thankfully, after 25 long seconds of screaming, the children
came bounding down a nearby hill, full of joy and innocence kept.Diana attacked them with threats and motherly
yelling.

Mike, who looked genuinely confused by all the fuss, said,
“Rick saw me walking with them.What is
the problem?”

My brain was still in revolt.Devoid of all information pertinent to the
situation.It was a vacuum.A black hole.I simply muttered, “Fox…children…America’s Most Wanted…”

All was well in the end and we made an official family rule
that moms and dads need to know where you are at all time and Elijah and Luca
seemed genuinely confused by the whole thing.

I sadly walked back to the party to continue murdering my
brain with Sam Adams Boston Lager.